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Chapter 72


Powerful Arguments: Logical Argument Mapping


Michael H.G. Hoffmann
Georgia Institute of Technology


1. Introduction

We all know that deductively valid arguments form only a very small subset of all
possible arguments. If we would try to provide a complete overview of all forms of
arguments people are using in all areas of life, it would hardly be a good idea to focus
only on the few well-known argument schemes of propositional and categorical logic.
However, the goal of representing all possible argument forms in a complete system of
argument representation is not all what argumentation theory is about. Another
legitimate part of argumentation theory is to develop argument representation systems
for specific purposes. This has been done, for example, by Perelman & Olbrechts-
Tyteca (1969 <1958>) for arguments whose primary purpose is to persuade somebody;
by the pragma-dialectical approach for arguments whose primary function is reaching
consensus (van Eemeren & Grootendorst 2004); and by the epistemological approach to
argumentation for arguments whose standard function is to justify knowledge and
truth claims (Lumer 2005a, 2005b; Goldman 1999).
In contrast to these approaches to argumentation, I am interested in argument
visualization systems whose primary purpose is to stimulate reflection and to confront
people with the limits of their own understanding; that is, to stimulate critical reflection
on ones own assumptions, especially those that usually remain hidden. I would like to
discuss argument visualization systems that focus on reflection under the heading of
reflective argumentation. This comes close to the way Tim van Gelder defines
deliberation: an activity, performed collectively or individually, that is aimed at
determining ones own attitude (van Gelder 2003, p. 98; see also van Gelder 2007).
The central idea of reflective argumentation can be captured by a nice quote by Andre
Maurois that Paul Kirschner, Simon Buckingham Shum, and Chad Carr used as a motto
for their seminal book Visualizing Argumentation: Software Tools for Collaborative and
Educational Sense-making: The difficult part in an argument is not to defend ones
opinion but rather to know it (Kirschner, Buckingham Shum, & Carr 2003, p. vii).
Wesley Salmon wrote already 50 years ago that the deductive argument is
designed to make explicit the content of the premises (Salmon 1963, p. 15). Exactly
this is the reason why I consider deductively valid argument forms as being crucial for
reflective argumentation. Based on the fact that we know how deductive arguments like
modus ponens or disjunctive syllogism must be constructed, we can take any claim we
want to argue for and construct the premises so that they fit into the logical scheme we
think is most adequate. This way, we can study those assumptions that would be
necessary to guarantee the truth of a conclusion, and we can experiment with alternative
formulations of our conclusion and our reasons to improve our argument. Since the
chosen argument scheme itself should not be controversial based on its deductive form,
we can concentrate our efforts on the question which argument scheme is most
appropriate, and how to formulate the content of premises and conclusions. Thus, we
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are encouraged to focus on what is most important for any argument: the conclusion, the
reasons, and the connection between reasons and conclusion.
For the purpose of this paper I call arguments that support reflection along these
lines powerful arguments. More precisely, I define powerful arguments as arguments
that leave only one choice for a potential opponent: either to accept the conclusion or to
defeat one of its premises. In the first part of this contribution, I will present an
argument for the thesis that so defined powerful arguments are possible when we do not
only provide reasons as premises of an argument, but also what I call an enabler. An
enabler is that premise in an argument that guarantees that the reason provided in this
argument is sufficient to justify the claim or conclusion. In the second part I am
providing an argument for the theses that powerful arguments promote mutual
understanding and self-reflexivity.
I will present both these arguments by means of Logical Argument Mapping
(LAM), a method for the visualization of arguments that I developed over the past
years. Compared to other argument visualization tools (see Scheuer, Loll, Pinkwart, &
McLaren 2010 for an overview), LAM is unique in requiring that every main argument
and every argument that might be controversial in an argumentation has to be
constructed by means of a deductively valid argument scheme (see
http://lam.spp.gatech.edu/, and for a planned web-based and interactive software version
http://agora.gatech.edu/). Since a deductively valid argument is only complete if it
includes a conclusion, one or more reasons, and an enabler that guarantees that this
reason (or these reasons) if true are sufficient to determine the truth of the
conclusion, LAM promotes the construction of powerful arguments.
In the third part, finally, I will demonstrate with an example how LAM can
facilitate a better understanding of others and of our own reasoning. My example is an
article by Thomas Nagel in which he argued that we dont have a moral obligation to
respond to the gruesome facts of inequality in the world economy.


2. How are powerful arguments possible?

My argument for the thesis that powerful arguments are possible when we do not only
provide reasons, but also an enabler that guarantees that these reasons are sufficient to
determine the conclusion, is represented in Figure 1.

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Figure 1
In Logical Argument Mapping, statements in oval text boxes represent universal
statements. Universal statement is defined as a proposition that can be falsified by one
counterexample. In this sense, laws, rules, and all statements that include ought,
should, or other forms indicating normativity, are universal statements. Any other
proposition is treated as a particular statement, including statements about possibilities.
The distinction between universal and particular statements is important only with
regard to the consequences of different forms of objections: If a premise is defeated,
then the conclusion and every chain of arguments that depends on this premise is
defeated as well; but if a premise is only questioned or criticized, then the conclusion
and everything depending on it is only questioned, but not defeated. While universal
statements can easily be defeated by a counterexample to the rule, law, or norm that is
represented in form of a universal statement, it depends on an agreement among
deliberators whether a counterargument against a particular statement is sufficient to
defeat it, even though it is always sufficient to question it and to shift, thus, the burden
of proof.
These considerations show that Logical Argument Mapping realizes at least in
a limited sense what has been described in the literature as defeasible reasoning
(Pollock 2008; Prakken & Vreeswijk 2001; Walton 2006). It is a limited form of
defeasible reasoning because not the deductive argument schemes are defeasible, but
only reasons and enablers. Although this contradicts the widely shared assumption that
only non-deductive reasoning is defeasible (as claimed, for example, by Pollock 1995,
p. 40 and p. 85, and Prakken 2010, p. 169), I cannot see any reason not to consider
LAM as defeasible reasoning. According to the familiar semantics of defeasible,
anything is defeasible as long as it can be defeated. Any deductive argument can be
defeated by defeating one of its premises.
It is important for the reflective power of Logical Argument Mapping that it
does not make sense to attack the conclusion of a deductive argument without attacking
at least one of the premises, that is, either one of the reasons or the enabler. Since in a
deductively valid argument the conclusion is necessarily true if all the premises are true,
the attention of a potential opponent and the attention of the constructor of an
argument who is concerned with the possibility of opponents is naturally directed to
the premises.
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It is of course possible to construct an independent argument with a conclusion
that contradicts the conclusion of a given argument. But such an alternative argument
Pollock would call it a rebutting defeater (Pollock, 1995, p. 40) is in itself not
sufficient to defeat the original argument. Since such an alternative argument might be
based on reasons and inference rules that the proponent of the original does not accept,
the case of conflicting arguments only indicates that proponent and opponent frame
the problem in question differently; that is, they construct arguments that are based on
conflicting belief systems. (See Hoffmann, forthcoming, for an example, reconstructed
by means of LAM, of how a Palestinian and an Israeli scholar provide conflicting
arguments on how to deal with Hamas after its victory in the 2006 elections.) In Logical
Argument Mapping, an argument or argumentation (i.e., network of connected
arguments) can only be defeated by taking its assumptions seriously, not by providing
something else.


3. Why powerful arguments promote mutual understanding and self-reflexivity

My argument for the thesis that powerful arguments, as long as they are defined as
proposed in the introduction, promote mutual understanding and self-reflexivity is, to be
precise, an argumentation. That is, the two reasons that are provided in Figure 2 are
themselves justified by the arguments represented in Figure 3 and Figure 4.


Figure 2
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Figure 3

Figure 4


4. An example: Thomas Nagels argument against global justice

In order to provide a more complex example of how Logical Argument Mapping can be
used to support the process of understanding someones position, and of our own
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reasoning about this position, I want to present in Figure 5 a reconstruction of what I
think is the core argument of Thomas Nagels article The Problem of Global Justice
(Nagel, 2005). This reconstruction was motivated by the fact that my graduate students
found it extremely hard to understand the argument. In my own efforts to identify the
structure of Nagels argumentation, I went through several revisions of my original
LAM map. Each of these revisions led to different objections to his argumentation. The
revisions were mainly motivated by attempts to simplify the structure of the
argumentation, and to refute my own objections against Nagels argument. This way,
the experience of revising the argument time and again proves to me the potential of
Logical Argument Mapping both to deepen an understanding of the given material and
to stimulate self-reflection. I have to say that I found Nagels argumentation to be very
strong at the end, although I started off with the assumption that his final conclusion is
simply unacceptable.
Figure 5 represents only one chain of Nagels core argument, and it includes
only one objection (in yellow) which questions the enabler of the main argument on
the left side of the map. The complete core argument consists, I think, of two
independent chains of arguments (see http://tinyurl.com/23vweqm).
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Figure 5
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As can be seen in the online version of the complete core argument, I am
inclined to think that the second chain can be defeated. (The online map shows only the
defeaters without marking the defeated parts, that is without marking the whole chain of
statements that depends on the defeated premises). However, the chain that is
represented in Figure 5 still stands, although questioned in its final part.
Nagels article is 34 pages long. A complete reconstruction of the entire article
in a LAM map is published at http://tinyurl.com/22o9q9q. This map consists of about a
hundred textboxes.


5. Conclusion

I tried to show in this paper by means of both an argumentation and an example that
focusing on deductive arguments makes sense when the goal is to stimulate reflection
on ones own reasoning. The notion of reflective argumentation can be used to
describe this special function of engaging in arguments. The advantage of using
deductive arguments for this purpose is that a reconstruction of an argument in logical
form can show us how its premises would need to look like if the goal were to guarantee
the truth of the conclusion. The point is to get the content of the premises right. This can
rather easily be achieved by using the well-known deductive argument schemes as a
normative standard of argument construction. This standard determines how the
premises must be formulated when we want to argue for a certain claim.
Visualizing arguments and argumentations in deductively valid form stimulates
reflection because it challenges the arguer to break down his or her reasoning into
argumentative steps as long as it takes to produce a chain of reasons and enablers that
are all acceptable for the arguer without further justification. Based on the arguments
provided in this paper, I consider Logical Argument Mapping (LAM) to be a powerful
form of argument visualization.




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